


Meant to Be

by erinmckenziee



Category: Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice
Genre: Adoption, Drama, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family, Family Drama, Love, Mother-Daughter Relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-22
Updated: 2019-08-28
Packaged: 2020-09-23 20:22:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20346163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erinmckenziee/pseuds/erinmckenziee
Summary: After two failed attempts at IVF, losing out on an adoption, and an upsetting break-up, Addison Montgomery wondered when it was finally going to be her turn. When would her life finally be all that she wanted it to be? She was at a loss; until the arrival of a young new doctor leaves her wondering if everything she's been searching for is actually right in front of her.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So the idea for this story originally came to me a few years ago when I was working on a final for a creative writing class in college. Then I figured, why not apply it to one of my favorite characters on television?
> 
> This story starts mid-season 5 of Private Practice, specifically around episodes 10/11/12, after Addison's failed IVF and losing her first attempt at adoption. I hope you like it, and thanks so much for reading!

**February, 1983  
** **Hartford, Connecticut**

The pain was unbearable, unlike nothing she’d ever felt before. It was like something – or _ someone _ – was ripping her in half, and she begged, prayed for it to end. She just wanted it to be over.

“Oh God, can’t you just pull it out already?!” A sixteen year old Addison Montgomery shouted through gritted teeth. 

She wasn’t even in a hospital; secluded in the most private section of her parents large estate in Hartford, Connecticut, Addison was in the middle of a very difficult labor. It had been over 24 hours, and she was exhausted, scared, and heartbroken – everything a woman shouldn’t be while giving birth.

In reality, it had been so much longer than 24 hours. For Addison, it had been an excruciating nine months, from finding out she was a pregnant teenager, to telling her parents – her upper class, “high in society” parents – to becoming “that girl” at school; the girl none of the other “high in society” parents wanted their daughters to associate with, since she so obviously showed poor judgment and was unable to keep her knees closed until marriage.

For a while, Addison had scoffed. _ If only those parents knew what their daughters did behind their back _, she thought. They just got lucky, didn’t have to suffer the consequences like she did. The looks, the whispers, being ostracized by everyone who used to be your friend…

But then, no matter how hard she tried, it started to get under her skin.

_ The looks, the whispers, being ostracized by everyone who used to be your friend… _

It became difficult for even her own mother to look at her. Bizzy Forbes Montgomery was not a woman who tolerated misbehavior, anything that took away from her concept of normalcy or made heads turn in her direction. From months four through nine, Addison was not to attend any public function or any extracurricular activity in school; as if she wanted to in the first place, she would think to herself.

Her father kept to his work, coming home only for long weekends or to have a quick tryst with the maid. When Addison was younger it was her and her brother Archer’s nanny, then the French tutor, then his secretary…Captain Montgomery always thought no one ever knew, but how could she not? As a child, Addison and her brother worshipped the ground their father walked on. 

Her brother Archer was really the only one to stick by her side throughout the past nine months, anything from threatening to beat up the boy who did it to threatening to beat up anyone who snickered behind his little sister’s back. Because Archer Montgomery was the only one who knew the truth about that night, Addison with that boy…

It wasn’t even on purpose that she told him, but when he caught her one night mid-panic attack, clutching her middle and struggling to breathe, she felt no choice but to tell him what really happened. How her baby was conceived.

“Addison, you _ have _ to go to the police,” Archer had told her.

“No. Absolutely not.” Addison said, with a fire in her eyes. “Things are bad enough as it is and without any help from the police. Aside from school Bizzy has me on lockdown, what good would it do to involve the authorities? Besides, this isn’t New York City; this is Connecticut. People…Archer people don’t talk about this kind of thing here. This kind of thing _ doesn’t happen _here.”

“But it happened to you,” Archer whispered.

“No, Archer. I said no. No police.”

That was the end of that.

Archer wasn’t in the room with Addison when the labor started. He wasn’t even in the house – he was off at Yale, pre-med of course. The Captain would expect nothing less from a son. Oh how Addison ached for him, her only friend throughout this ordeal. _ Ordeal _ – she wanted to laugh at the word. Since when did women refer to their babies as _ ordeals? _

Addison moaned, bringing herself back to the present, her head thrashing back and forth and wishing more than anything her brother could be there to comfort her.

The doctor—a man—sat down between Addison’s legs, a sight that made her want to vomit and scream at him to get away from her, not to touch her.

“The baby’s crowning,” he said flatly, reaching toward her with a gloved hand. “You’re going to need to start pushing.”

“No, no…” Addison stammered. “Just pull it out. Hurts too much…”

“Well you should have thought of that Addison, before sleeping with the first boy who asked you asked you to the prom,” Bizzy snapped.

_ He didn’t ask me to the prom! _ Addison wanted to scream. He was at the prom, she was at the prom…but he didn’t ask her there. 

She wasn’t keeping this baby, that much was known even before she started showing. He – or she – was going straight to the orphanage, Bizzy’s order sending a chill down Addison’s spine. Her baby wasn’t an orphan; she was its mother, no matter how young.

“On the count of three,” the doctor ordered.

Addison sat up, pushing with all her might. There was so much pain, no light at the end of the tunnel. She swore she was dying, there was no coming out of this, and then the doctor ordered her to stop. Sweating, Addison looked around the room with wide, scared eyes. Bizzy was standing in the corner, and Addison willed her mother to look at her, to somehow…_ understand _. But it was hopeless; Bizzy would never understand.

She pushed again, too exhausted to believe an actual human life was slipping right through her. No one was there to hold her hand. There were people in the room, but she felt so alone, so very very alone.

The head was out; that much she heard. Sweat poured down her face in large drops, like she had just plunged headfirst into the Connecticut River.

“Is it out yet?” She wanted to ask. “Is it a girl or a boy?”

What did it matter at this point, really? She wasn’t keeping it.

“Just one more, one more,” the doctor said, and Addison pushed. One more, one more.

The room filled with the sound of a baby crying, _ her _ baby crying.

“It’s a girl,” the doctor announced.

Addison lie back on the bed, panting, trying to relax her aching muscles. She hurt everywhere. “Let me see her,” she muttered. She noticed her mother about to protest, so she tried again. “Please, I have to hold her.”

Reluctantly, the doctor handed Addison her daughter. _ Her daughter _.

“Oh…” Addison lost her breath, staring down at the tiny auburn-haired girl. A feeling spread within her, one she didn’t think she could ever put into words, but it was unlike anything she had ever felt before in her life. Leaning forward, she kissed the baby’s forehead. “Your name is Alina,” she said.

“Alright, that’s enough,” Bizzy snapped, as if she wanted to keep her daughter as unattached to this baby as possible.

“Her name is Alina,” Addison insisted, looking up at her mother. “She’s my baby.”

“Addison, I said that’s enough.” Bizzy repeated herself before turning to the doctor. “Take her.”

“No, no…” Addison felt the tears spring to her eyes. “Please don’t take her…” But her voice had grown almost inaudible, a great lump forming in her throat.

Before she knew it, her daughter was being ripped from her arms, mouth opening like she wanted to nurse. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. One moment she was in agonizing labor, the next she was holding her beautiful baby girl, and now, now her baby was being taken from her.

“No,” Addison cried. “Give her back!”

No one was listening. Bizzy whispered instructions to the doctor while Addison craned her neck to see her daughter. “Please, give her back,” she said over and over again, her voice barely a whisper.

But with the blink of an eye, the doctor was gone. Her baby was gone. Addison wailed, crying hysterically for her baby Alina, knowing two things: one, she would never see her daughter again, and two; that feeling that had spread within her that she couldn’t describe before – she could now.

That feeling was love.

* * *

**January, 2012  
** **Los Angeles, California**

Addison played through the memory a million times over in her head, sitting on her back deck, listening to the ocean waves flow in and out. Just her and the clear night sky, the bright stars above shining down on her, almost as if they were shiny beacons of hope. But Addison had no more hope left inside her.

She had had a baby; a girl, ripped from her arms unjustly and involuntarily. A baby she shouldn’t have wanted, but did.

She had another baby; sucked from her uterus voluntarily because it wasn’t the right time, nor was it with the right guy.

When she was finally ready to have a baby on her own terms, she’d been told – by her best friend no less – she would no longer be able to. Yet, years later, when a man by the name of Jake Reilly came to work for Seaside Health & Wellness, Addison had thought, if only for a moment, that maybe he was her last beacon of hope. So she gathered her courage and put herself through two rounds of IVF treatment.

Two months ago, her second and final attempt at IVF had failed. Her second and final attempt to become a mother (on her own terms) had failed.

And today, today she lost out for an adoption. She had a birth mother, and she lost her; she lost her chance at raising a little girl.

The warm breeze flowed through her hair as she stared straight ahead, right at the spot where the light from the moon hit the water. Addison had no idea how many minutes had passed before she heard him, the slow patter of shoes against his wooden deck; her boyfriend, Sam Bennett.

Sam Bennett. That relationship in itself was complicated. At first, to Addison, it had felt so right, so wonderful to be in the arms of this man who she had known for years, who had known her for years. Never mind that he used to be married to her best friend; it’s not that Addison wanted to hurt Naomi, but in her heart she just felt that Sam was the one.

But that’s the funny thing about love, it has a way of changing when you least expect it to. Just like Addison’s mother used to say: _ People Plan and God Laughs. _

Now she had no idea what she felt for Sam. He had known for a very long time how much she yearned to be a mother, how much having the abortion came back to haunt her. The only thing he didn’t know was of Addison’s baby she _ did _ have back in 1983. No, only Derek knew about her, and that’s the way Addison had always wanted to keep it. Alina—or, let’s face it, that probably wasn’t even her name anymore—was her past, and she needed to look toward the future.

And yet, having a baby with Addison seemed to be the last thing Sam Bennett wanted in his life for whatever reason. He claimed it was because of Maya and Olivia, but Addison knew better. She knew there was something holding him back, but she couldn’t reach it, and now she wasn’t even sure she wanted to.

Sam stood on the edge of the porch, and Addison could feel him watching her. She couldn’t look at him, because she couldn’t imagine what he could possibly have to say to make her feel better. Before the adoption process had even started, he had removed all traces of himself from Addison’s house, proving without a doubt (to the adoption agency) that he wanted nothing to do with her getting a new baby. 

“I didn’t get the baby,” she said, still staring straight into the ocean.

Sam sighed, sitting on the adjacent deck chair. “I’m sorry.”

Addison nodded, wanting nothing more than to roll her eyes, scream, lash out at him. The nerve; coming here and pretending to be sorry when really, he couldn’t be happier, and he wasn’t doing a good job at hiding it.

“I know how much this means to you,” he said. “And I’m sorry for your disappointment.”

Addison was silent.

“I love you,” Sam finished.

That grabbed her attention. Turning her head slowly, she finally met his gaze; that gaze that two years ago, made her weak in the knees.

“I love you too,” she replied, placing a hand on his knee.

Sam shook his head. “You can’t do this anymore.”

Addison felt a clench in her chest. “I know.”

Sam took hold of her hand, as if he thought this could comfort her, shield the blow of what she already knew was coming. “So this is it?”

They were breaking up.

“Yeah, this is it,” Addison said quietly.

I wanted a baby and I wanted Sam, and I got no baby and no Sam.  
_ How am I supposed to believe in anything ever again?  
_How is love not enough?


	2. Chapter 2

**February, 2012  
** **One month later  
** **Los Angeles, California**

She couldn’t sleep anymore. All she could do was lie in bed and think about how one side was empty – _ too _ empty. 

_ I couldn’t sleep, and I kept trying to tell myself that it was from something other than Sam but I mean, come on. How can I ignore the fact that my bed is half empty? It’s like this…space that I can’t…occupy. You know, it’s his space. It’s Sam’s space. He belongs there. _

She had said this to her therapist just this morning, in the hopes that he would have some words of wisdom to make her feel slightly less crazy and clingy to this (now ex) boyfriend who didn’t even treat her all that well to begin with. But that’s the thing; Addison knew, as soon as she made it clear she wanted a baby, she knew Sam was not treating her how a significant other should be treated, how she _ deserved _ to be treated. 

Still, the therapist offered little help…as usual. No matter how many times she fit the phrase “I couldn’t sleep” into a sentence, all he seemed to do was respond to her with a question.

“Why couldn’t you sleep?”

“Are you afraid to sleep in ‘Sam’s space’?”

“What was so captivating about that television show on shin-kicking you watched in the middle of the night?”

“Oh give me a break,” Addison scoffed to herself in the middle of the night, lying in bed.

What the hell was she paying this guy for anyhow? To play 20 Questions with her for an hour?

That morning, before even going to the therapist’s office she had stood on her bedroom balcony overlooking the ocean, clad only in her pajamas and bathrobe, when who should appear but the (ex) boyfriend himself. She had felt a pang in her chest, seeing him – all tall and muscular with that “just woken up” look she had loved so much – and not being able to do or say anything. On the outside she looked calm as he glanced over at her, watched her for a moment, but internally she was screaming; her heart was beating so fast she felt like she could run five miles.

He had walked back inside, leaving her alone with her thoughts and screaming insides. Then again, that seemed to be the theme of her life lately; alone.

Since the failed adoption, the days at work all seemed to flow together – nothing special, just work. Patient after patient with the occasional hospital visit. Oh, and the occasional questioning of Addison’s sudden exhaustion at trying to have a baby.

She was pretty sure Jake was going to call her out for going insane when he caught her dumping coffee beans straight into the case, forgetting to add the filter.

“You all right there?” He asked.

“Yeah,” she chuckled sarcastically. “No. Sam and I broke up.”

Jake had questioned her, trying his hardest to seem surprised, when really he’s just as bad at faking it as Sam was when he apologized for her “not getting what she wanted.”

Amelia had encouraged her to go down the surrogacy route; “Why not surrogacy? You get your baby and someone else’s boobs take the hit.”

As much as she wanted to laugh at her, and as much as her former sister-in-law was right, Addison wasn’t in the mood to jump through any more hoops. She had jumped through so many, just to get…what?

Two failed attempts at IVF, passed over for an adoption, and forced to give her only daughter away twenty-nine years ago.

So many people seemed to be having children, or at least already had them. Sam and Naomi have Maya, and now Olivia. Violet and Pete – both of whom never even wanted children! – have Lucas. Cooper just found out he had a son, Mason…when was it going to be her turn?

Her conversation with her best friend Dr. Violet Turner in the St. Ambrose ER played through her head over and over again too.

_ What do you do when the one person who can make you feel better won’t talk to you? _

Oh she wished with all her might that Sam wasn’t that person. Why couldn’t it be Violet, or Amelia – her little sister – or Jake, or even _ Mark _ for God’s sake? Anyone but Sam Bennett.

Addison sighed, turning over onto her side facing the window. She thought about Violet’s words again, her suggestion to try sleeping sideways. Rolling her eyes, Addison shuffled around in bed until her legs were at the corner opposite to her head. Her feet immediately felt cold, like they were crossing a line into some foreign territory they weren’t supposed to be in. 

“I’m waiting…” she mumbled, waiting to get that “oddly comforting” feeling Violet described getting after Pete left her. Nothing. “God, why can’t I just sleep?!” She yelled, scaring Milo, her orange tabby cat, awake and out of his favorite sleeping spot by the floor vent.

This was not what she meant when she said she wanted her life to change. It definitely _ was _ changing, but not for the better. Every guy she met turned out to be the wrong one, and still, five years later, she didn’t have her baby. Quickly, she threw off the sheets and got out of bed, walking back outside to stand on the balcony. She may as well turn this into a nightly ritual, she thought to herself. Eventually Milo came outside and rubbed against her legs, wanting to be picked up.

“Hey buddy,” she cooed, scratching behind the cat’s ears. Milo purred, nuzzling his face against her neck; although he was just a cat, she relished in the affection. 

Staring out into the ocean once again, Addison realized she was in for another long night, another long, sleepless night wondering when it was finally going to be her turn.

* * *

“Did you know all the guys went out last night?” Violet asked, walking briskly into Addison’s office the next morning.

“Really?” Addison looked up at her, doing her best to appear unperturbed.

Violet sighed, falling into Addison’s plush office couch. “So Sam could get his mind off you.”

“That’s why he didn’t come home,” Addison answered automatically, not even thinking that she just admitted to stalking her ex to her best friend. But Violet just sat there, flipping through a magazine. “I was up all night again,” Addison continued. “I did not hear the garage open, I did not see the lights go on.”

“I feel like Pete is using this separation to have the bachelor party that he never had,” Violet huffed. “You know, he wants to sow his wild – _ old _ – oats.”

“He told you that?”

“Yeah…I pretended not to care.”

“Do you?”

Violet paused. “Well, I don’t want to. I mean, intellectually I understand where Pete is coming from, but emotionally, I...I haven’t processed him being with other women yet! Does he think our marriage is over?”

“Maybe he just has a different idea of what separation is, you know?” Addison suggested. “You prefer sleeping sideways; he prefers sowing his wild, old oats.”

Violet gave her a look.

“Oh come on, a part of me _ hopes _ that Sam moves on, you know? I mean, I wonder if I didn’t hold him hostage…with all the baby stuff.” What Violet doesn’t know is that Addison wondered that more often than not. 

“You’re trying to be happy!” Violet said.

Addison leaned back in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest. “Maybe Pete is too.”

The two women sat in silence for a moment, contemplating.

“No, you know what, whatever Pete’s doing…” Violet paused, sitting up straighter. “You do not go looking for happiness by sleeping with every big-busted blonde in Los Angeles County. What he’s doing is…I don’t know. It’s like he’s getting back at me for…something.”

“Like what?” Addison asked incredulously. “Taking care of him after he had a heart attack?”

“I have no idea,” Violet admitted. “I don’t know if I’ll ever understand. In fact, I’m not sure I’ll ever understand men. Let’s just hope Lucas doesn’t grow up to be one of those guys who spends all his time running from woman to woman…”

“No, do not even worry about that. Because you’re gonna raise him to be better than that,” Addison said. 

“Well, one can hope,” Violet sighed.

Addison replayed that over and over in her head too – one could hope that all was not lost for the adult male species.

* * *

Once five o’clock rolled around, she thought about going home, but what was the point anymore? It’s not like Addison had anyone there waiting for her. God, she sounded so pathetic; she felt like she was complaining to literally everyone with a pulse about one thing or another. The baby, the boyfriend, all her hopes and dreams…it was a wonder no one had hit her yet, she thought to herself.

She just…she just wanted a _ sign _, a sign that everything was going to be okay, that she could move forward with her life and leave Sam and all those babies in the past. Getting up from her desk, Addison plopped down on her office couch, resting her head in her hands. She doesn’t know how much time passed before the sound of footsteps drew nearer.

“You still sulking?”

Of course it had to be Dr. Jake Reilly; the Fiji guy, the guy Addison had absolutely no idea her feelings for. Perfect.

“I’m not sulking,” she sighed. “Too much energy. I am too far past exhaustion to sulk.”

“Looks like sulking from here,” Jake muttered, standing in her office doorway and taking a sip from his coffee mug.

Addison leaned back, annoyed. “You know what you are? You’re a peddler…a baby peddler.”

“Is that right?” Jake raised an eyebrow.

“Mhm,” Addison replied, nursing her own mug of tea. “It is. And you’re probably here to give me some sort of pep talk where, to summarize, you’ll tell me to get back on the horse. You’re a peddler.”

Jake chuckled, sitting next to her on the couch. “Are you getting back together with Sam?”

This time it was Addison’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “Why would you ask that?”

“Well, you gave Sam up because you wanted a baby,” Jake said. “And if you’re not getting back together with him then a baby is still what you want.”

Damn Jake Reilly and his way of putting words into sentences and making them come out perfectly. Damn him and his logic.

“Give me your hand,” he said.

“What?”

“Until you have a baby I consider you my patient. Give me your hand.”

Addison laughed, setting her cup down. “Okay.”

“I have heard every word of this before,” Jake began. “And I have told women when it’s time to throw in the towel, and you are not there yet. You’re not even close. If you want this, we can make it happen.”

Staring straight into his eyes, Addison was mesmerized by his words, by the softness of his hand, gently holding onto hers…

“I know you’ve felt alone in this before,” Jake continued. “But you don’t need to feel that way anymore because you’ve got me. I will always be there, Addison.”

She continued to stare at him in silence and not before long he began rubbing soft circles on her hand with this thumb.

“You say that to all your patients?” Addison asked after a moment.

Jake smiled softly. “Not all of it.”

Suddenly, her eyes began to feel very heavy, like sitting here with Jake could actually make her fall asl-

Her pager beeped, snapping her out of it. “Oh!” She sat up with a start, pulling the pager out from her bag. Speak of the devil, it was Pete, paging from the ER.

Addison looked at Jake apologetically. “I…have to go. It’s Pete, he’s got a patient in the ER.”

“Say no more,” Jake said. “You just remember to keep all your options open.”

“Right,” Addison replied quickly, but giving a genuine smile. “Thanks. I mean it. You’re a decent guy, Jake.”

_ Decent enough that I wish it were you I stayed up all night thinking about. _

* * *

As soon as she entered the ER, stethoscope wrapped around her neck, she craned her neck searching for Pete and his – well now their – patient.

“Hang another unit!” Dr. Pete Wilder’s voice sounded throughout the room. Addison ran to it, but when she got there she realized that it wasn’t just Pete in the room, there was another doctor there too, pushing two doses of Epinephrine.

“We have to get her to the OR, or she’s going to bleed out,” the woman ordered. She had to be the youngest doctor at St. Ambrose Addison had ever seen, tall with auburn/brown hair and a slight Eastern European accent she couldn’t place.

“Oh good, Addison you’re here,” Pete said upon noticing her arrival. “This is Alexis Miller, thirty-two weeks, brought in by ambulance after getting hit by a car…came to me for a holistic birth plan in her twelfth week.”

“Oh God,” Addison muttered, immediately going to check for a fetal heart rate. Pulling up Alexis’ shirt, she immediately noticed bruising on the abdomen. “No,” she said. “There’s no time. We have to get this baby out right away.”

“I’m sorry Dr. Montgomery but we can’t do that just yet,” the woman stopped her.

“I’m sorry who are you?” Addison asked without even looking up.

“This is Dr. Levin,” Pete answered for her. “She’s one of our new emergency medicine fellows.”

“Oh, well Dr. Levin I can assure you I’ve been doing this since before you could walk so if you’ll excuse me…” Addison began wheeling the patient toward the trauma OR.

“She has a severe intestinal bleed and that baby is the only thing keeping her from bleeding out!” Dr. Levin followed behind her closely, not giving up. And where the hell did Pete go? “Her scans indicate multiple-”

“Well lucky for you that’s not your call anymore because this is no longer your patient,” Addison snapped, interrupting and not wanting to deal with this woman, wherever she came from, who has not even half the medical training Addison does. “Stay out of my OR.” She looked around frantically for Pete. “Pete!”

As soon as Pete returned to her side, she left to scrub in. She had to move as quickly as possible, to ignore the angered look on this new fetus-fellow’s face, and to get that baby out of there before…

* * *

Both mother and baby died. Addison had later learned there was no father in the picture, no one to call. The mother and her daughter were all each other had, and neither of them survived. Worst of all, the fellow was right; as soon as Addison had reached in for the baby, Alexis had started bleeding out, and fast. Within seconds, there was no saving her. Yet, Addison was at a loss of what she would have done if she had left the baby in. 

She was exhausted; if she didn’t feel like going home from her office earlier, now it seemed like there was no better place. Today was not a good day, and Addison was not in a good mood.

Carrying her scrub cap tightly in one hand with her nails digging into her palm, Addison threw open the door to a dark on-call room, needing to take a few minutes to settle before even thinking about getting into a car. She was just about to crash into the bed when she noticed it was in fact, already occupied. Dr. Levin was sitting up, staring her straight in the eyes like she already knew what happened.

“Oh,” Addison scoffed. “Just wonderful.”

“I’m not going to say ‘I told you so’ if that’s what you’re thinking,” the young doctor said. “You couldn’t have known. You didn’t even look at her scans.”

“Okay, spare me the condescending lecture, there was no saving that woman and you know it; she would have bled out no matter what we did.”

Dr. Levin sighed. “There’s no use arguing it now; Alexis and the baby are gone.”

Addison felt a pang in her chest at the softness of the young woman’s voice. “Since when did you work here anyway?”

“Three weeks ago,” Dr. Leven replied. “I’ve already completed my residency in pediatrics with Harvard at Mass. Gen., but then I found out about St. Ambrose’s emergency medicine fellowship program…”

“St. Ambrose has a fellowship program?” Addison interrupted, just now remembering she’d never heard of such a thing.

“It’s new this year…didn’t you know? Or does Dr. King not keep her attending surgeons in the loop?”

“Apparently she doesn’t,” Addison said through gritted teeth. 

“Well if you don’t mind I’m going to go find another room to sleep in. You look like you could use this one more than me.” Dr. Levin stood up to leave. 

“Wait,” Addison found herself stopping her.

“Yes?”

“What…what did you say your name was again?”

“I didn’t, Dr. Wilder did. But it’s Dr. Levin, Alina Levin.” 

The young doctor turned and left without so much as a handshake. 

Addison fell back onto the bed. _ Alina _. Her stomach churned at the mixed feelings she felt behind the name. She may have been looking for a sign earlier, but this just seemed like a cruel joke.


End file.
